Dear Members
Ahead of the summer break I wanted to drop a note outlining some thoughts for what I hope will be a great 2022/23 season for every member of the MGGB.
Firstly, a huge thank you to Magnus for giving us such a brilliant and in-person season, which challenged the conventions, created some brilliant talking points across the year, and true to your goal, kickstarted our journey of greater inclusion. Thank you Magnus, I will be calling on your support throughout the year.
It’s such a privilege to be chairing the next season. The MGGB means so much to me as a member and whilst the great speakers always make it a memorable night, it’s the community that is the MGGB that makes it so special.
I’ve outlined my theme below, but most of all I wanted to make sure as Chair, it’s in service to the members across the season. That we continue the journey of inclusion and transformation, and also really double down on membership engagement.
Every previous chair has given exactly the same advice. ‘It’s great to have a theme, though be prepared to completely forget the theme if there is a cracking speaker’; advice I will be sure to follow.
However, I hope to have speakers that can offer their wisdom and inspiration in these extraordinary times for businesses and for leaders. Almost everything we see is in the process of transformation. Transformation in technology, society, inclusion, commerce, creativity, media, geopolitics and culture, and it’s this theme that I’d like to explore together in my year as Chair.
We start with technology and I’m very pleased that to kick us off we have Professor Marcus du Sautoy speaking.
Marcus is the Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science at the University of Oxford, a role he recently took over from Professor Richard Dawkins. As well as the author of 8 books, Marcus has one of the deepest understandings in the UK of what will be one of the most transformative technologies of our time – Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence. Of particular interest to us is his perspective on AI and Creativity, a topic he explored in his book ‘The Creativity Code: How AI is learning to write, paint and think’.
In the meantime, thanks everyone for all the support so far, I really hope we can make it our best ever in 2022/23. Wishing you a wonderful summer and see you in September!
Best wishes
Steve Hatch
Chair
MGGB